Children's Books Too Cool for School

I'm still reeling from this fast-paced mystery that is quickly garnering fame for having the most unreliable narrator on the planet.

Liar is told from the point of view of Micah, a seventeen year-old compulsive liar with a dead (mabye... sort of) boyfriend. Besides the dead guy, there are other mysteries in Micah life, like why does her extended family live like pioneer folks, why does she have such a deep dislike for her brother, and what, oh what, is the "family illness"? (One is tempted to think it is compulsive lying, but in any case...)

The story's pace is lightening fast, almost hard to keep up with -- there are so many twists and turns as Micah keeps revising what she promises is "the truth." I enjoyed this aspect of the story very much.

Yet, I had difficulty connecting with Micah herself. Not because she's an unreliable narrator (I've read, and connected with plenty of these in the past), but because there's so little I share with her. Perhaps, were I seventeen, the case may be different, but I don't think so. I'm not so senile yet that I forgotten the feeling of teenage-hood. Without being able to quantify it well, I'll have to leave it at "Micah and I didn't really connect." Maybe this is because the overwhelming impression I get from Micah isn't that she is talking to me, and trying to convince me of the truth, but more that she is trying to convince herself. I, the reader, am really irrelevant in this scenario.

As for the other characters, well, Micah isn't a very good narrator, in addition to being unreliable. That is to say that none of the rest of the people she describes have any real flesh to them. Not a keen observer of character, that Micah.

Yet, for all this, I probably would have felt better about the whole story, if it weren't for a certain moment I'm going to have to be coy about. Suffice to say that about halfway through the novel, there was a moment between three teens in a cave that I was still trying to digest when the novel started a new section and declared a "truth" that left me going, "Really? No, really?" Yes, really.

I'm not sure if it was clever... a gimmick... a clever gimmick? It was certainly interesting, and added a whole new dimension to the idea of the narrator's credibility, but, oh I can't explain it. You may have to read it for yourself, despite my less-than-glowing review. Otherwise, I'll ruing the whole story. Now *that* is the sort of thing that novel-buzz is made of, n'est-ce pas?

As for the moment in the cave: That led to a sort of dispensable bizarre subplot of dubious veracity that I didn't much enjoy. But I'm coming to discover that I'm something of a literary prude, anyway. Be forewarned that this novel is full of sexual situations, adult language, and a whole lot of violence.

The long and short of it is, my feelings about this book are about as unreliable as Micah, but what can be said for it is this -- Liar will stick with me for a long time to come.

Boys are usually reluctant to read novels with a female protagonist, but I think that they'd really enjoy this one if you can get them past that. A late YA novel for sure, say ages 15-18.